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Letter: A prescription for failure

By Ron Snyder, Willmar on Oct 17, 2009 at 12:00 a.m.

Can pigs fly? They seem to in Washington, D.C. Consider the Baucus Senate health care plan (really an entitlement). In conjunction with the Congressional Budget Office, Baucus has unveiled his $829 billion plan over the next 10 years that he says will reduce the federal budget by $81 billion.

Spend a lot to save a little? Economics 101 gone haywire! Washington, D.C., economics was also unveiled in the cash for clunkers program, a miniature preview to universal federal health care economics. Abrams and Parsons of the University of Delaware added up the total benefits of the 700,000 vehicles sold versus the overall cost. They concluded a net cost of $2,000 per vehicle, a $1.4 billion net cost to taxpayers. Wacko Federal Economics 101 red ink again. While making their economic prediction, Baucus and the CBO also said, "Real costs may go higher," "The $81 billion reduction may require new taxes," and "Millions will still be uninsured." Do you think? Not only do pigs fly in Washington D.C., but unicorns and mermaids abound.

Precedents already exist that the Baucus bill will fail. The state-run universal health care programs in Massachusetts, New York, Tennessee, and Maine are budgetary failures. In Massachusetts family health care plans cost $13,788, the highest in the nation. The state has changed the rules three years out and now many middle-class insured people are forced to pay more, a $1,000 fine for not complying with the cap on out-of-pocket insurance expenses. In New York costs have risen since 1994 and now about 700,000 less people are enrolled. In 2005 TennCare dropped 170,000 enrolled people to avert bankruptcy. In these states premiums are rising, costs are escalating, while enrollments and access to care are decreasing. Does anybody in Washington acknowledge these failures? Politicians supporting universal health care are ignoring their constituents (56 percent are against the federal option) and the obvious state-run universal health care failures. We the people know where economic idiocy resides. The tragedy is that we the taxpayers will be forced to pay for it.